Garden Blog

Forest Gate Community Garden Friday, 12 May 2023   On Bank Holiday Monday, a group of volunteers, organised by the garden, planted out Earlham Bridge. After the planting, it rained overnight, giving the plants a good start. And they will need it, as these beds have proved difficult for us. Last year, we had a similar plant out, and 80% …

Forest Gate Community Garden Monday 1st May 2023   A busy weekend for the Garden, beginning with a plant sale on Saturday, with the Garden having plenty of visitors. Then, on Bank Holiday Monday, we had a stall at the Green Fair in Forest Lane Park. I was on the Forest Gate Festival stall, which severely limited what I saw …

Forest Gate Community Garden Sunday 23 April 2023   Six months ago, I suggested we have a display of wild flowers. This was agreed at a steering group meeting. But how to get them? My first thought was to buy seeds. But the seeds, I could find were mostly collections of wild flowers suitable for seeding a meadow, say.   …

Saturday 1 April 2023 Forest Gate Community Garden   It’s cold, with a biting wind. I look at the tadpoles in the pond; the mass of them are clustered under water over the remnant of the jelly. I am surprised they are not nearer the surface. Are they clustering to keep warm? I would expect them all over the pond …

Our tadpoles are just coming out of the jelly. A few are free-swimming, though masses of them are clinging to the jelly, and plenty are still inside. In a few days, there will be lots all over the pond. I don’t see any adult frogs, which were present for the spawning. They have done their bit and gone.   Thames …

I look at the frogspawn, the embryos are growing in the jelly. We might get the first tadpoles next weekend, if it doesn’t get cold again. We will have thousands of tadpoles, very popular with school visits. They begin as a large black patch on the jelly. If you look close, you see it’s made of hundreds of wriggling forms, …

We were given various Fair Trade foods by the Co-op on Woodgrange Road: tea, coffee, bars of chocolate, a range of biscuits, and a bunch of bananas. Fair Trade was set up so that small growers get a fair price for their produce, so they can feed themselves and their families, buy the necessities of life, and send their children …

On Saturday, we had the culmination of Learn Draw Grow – an artistic exploration of Dr John Fothergill’s legacy. He lived from 1712 to 1780, and in 1762 he bought Upton House, now West Ham Park. There, he amassed a large plant collection, said at the time to be second only to Kew’s. Fothergill employed a number of artists to …

February is very much a “between” month, still winter but in sight of spring. February, though, can be treacherous, or unseasonably warm. On 26 February 2019 it was 21º in London, but last February it was minus 23º in Scotland. Meanwhile, Storm Eunice was wreaking havoc in the Garden, blowing down the painted hoarding and tipping over our pots of …

It has been icy cold for the last week, but dry. This weather is bad for birds, many will freeze to death, as will many insects including bees. We keep our bird feeders full, doing what we can. Nature is an uncaring parent, the trials of her offspring are of no concern. I am reminded of the ancient Roman myth, …